Action Audio Apps, using London know-how, will let fans listen to chatter between coaches and players via cellphones 0

Allan Kool, president of Quantum5X Systems Inc., holds a QT-5000 Remotemic designed primarily to be worn by athletes during competition, allowing chatter to be picked up by a fan’s cellphone.(DEREK RUTTAN, The London Free Press)

Seated at the Rogers Centre watching the Toronto Maple Leafs, all it will take is a click of an app on your cellphone to listen to chatter on the bench between coach Randy Carlyle and forward Phil Kessel.

Thanks to made-in-London technology, it’s likely coming soon.

Quantum5X Systems on Adelaide St. has partnered with a New York technology firm to develop an app — called Action Audio Apps — that will bring action on the ice, field, court or bench, and the chatter between players and coaches, directly to a subscriber’s handheld device as it happens.

“This will change the way people experience live sports events forever,” said Sebastian Failla, president of Action Audio Apps Inc. in Pleasantville, N.Y.

“You will no longer watch the same way. It puts you on to the field, next to the coach, from your seat.”

While Failla has developed the app, which can be used on iPhones, Android phones, iPods and iPads, they were waiting for the right microphone technology, and that’s where Q5X in London made the notion a reality.

“They have the most advanced wireless microphone technology in the world,” Failla said.

Q5X supplies all major, professional sports leagues and teams with wireless microphones for players, coaches and referees.

“This launch is major for us. It opens all kinds of doors, into all kinds of markets,” said Allen Kool, Q5X president and founder.

“It has all kinds of possibilities.”

The app is aleady being used in the Federal Hockey League in northeastern U.S., and in boxing. Kool and Failla are in talks now with the major leagues.

The app will feature channels where fans can choose between players or coaches to listen in on.

It will also feature a slight delay, so the team can block any strategy discussion such as between a pitcher and catcher on the mound, or a football team in a huddle, but can broadcast it after the play to show the strategy discussion, Failla said.

“It will not be open mic, the audio will go back to a production team to add elements. We now have a three-second delay but that can be made longer or shorter depending on what we want to accomplish,” he said.

It may also feature colour commentary on one channel.

“The whole idea is to get more people enjoying all kinds of sports,” Kool said.

The app will be free to download, but offers several ways to make money for the team as well as Kool and Failla. Ads can be streamed on the app itself as it plays, the audio may have commercial breaks, and fans may have to pay for access to a game, so listening on that Leafs chatter may cost a few bucks. Sponsors will also pay for promotion on the app, Kool said.

“Labatt may be willing to pay to offer access to London Knights (or a London Lightning) game,” to attract fans, Kool said.